“Honestly?” Lorelei straightened the papers, then folded her hands neatly on top of the stack. “I think you’re sitting pretty if you take the deal.”
Knife hovering over the butter dish, Merina blinked at her friend. She abandoned the utensil, muffin forgotten. “I’m sorry, I swore I thought I heard you imply this is a good idea?”
Lorelei picked a hunk off the edge of her muffin and popped it into her mouth, then gestured around Merina’s living quarters. “Beautiful as your parents’ house is, I know you’re ready to leave.”
Merina sighed. She was past ready. Whenever she and Lorelei had lunch or drinks—sadly, it wasn’t that often since Lorelei had made partner at her firm—Merina moaned and complained about living with her parents. At age twenty-nine, it wasn’t exactly charming to be shacked up with Mom and Dad. She’d made due because the three-story house had a completely private upstairs, and save for the kitchen, she was able to feel as if she were in her own apartment. She now knew (after her mother’s reluctant revelation about their finances) that the rent Merina insisted on paying and grocery trips she made every other week had been helping.
Over the last few years, she’d spent so much time at work, she couldn’t see the point in moving out until she had a reason. And then she found one. A beautiful apartment close to the Van Heusen in an artsy building near the museum. She’d put down a deposit, intending to move after the holidays, but by last Thanksgiving her father’s heart attack had happened and her parents needed her more than ever. Also, the three of them were home together more than ever.
“I can move out without Reese Crane,” Merina grunted, buttering the muffin after all.
“This is true.” Lorelei nodded as she polished off the end of her muffin. “But if you with this ring, I thee wed, you can move out sooner, keep the Van Heusen, and you’ll be in charge of everyone’s jobs, including your own. This arrangement takes care of all your problems. Plus”—she dusted her hands, sending crumbs onto the napkin in front of her—“this would be a great test run for getting back on the horse.”
Merina’s entire face screwed to the side. “I think I’m about to be offended.”
“I’m your best friend,” Lore stated, resting a comforting palm over Merina’s hand. “I know you’ve been avoiding getting serious since Corbin. Reese Crane isn’t Corbin.”
Corbin. At the mention of her ex-boyfriend, Merina closed her eyes. Lorelei’s reassuring touch wasn’t reassuring at all. Corbin marked the one time in Merina’s life she wished she could rewind, erase, then fast-forward back to today.
She’d met him at a mixer at the Van Heusen’s former assistant manager’s house. She went to Liza’s because she was invited and she wanted to be friendly. She had no idea it was a setup until Liza shoved her brother, Corbin, in Merina’s face and left them suspiciously alone on the back porch. To her surprise, she liked him. A lot. He was fun and carefree…seemed less high-strung than the business sorts she’d dated in the past. Not that the list was long. It was mainly comprised of a few longish-term boyfriends during her college years, and then Corbin. Six years of semi-serious dating that had not resulted in marriage or even living together and had tied up what she now recalled fondly as her best dating years.
The evening at Liza’s led to exchanged phone numbers and from there turned into a few fun dates at Liza’s apartment where Corbin lived as her couch-crashing roommate. The third date ended in Merina’s bedroom, and she was grateful she had parents who were modern enough not to pry when she had a man over.
The beginning of the end came when Liza announced she was moving to Colorado to care for hers and Corbin’s aging mother. Corbin asked to stay with Merina for the short-term and she hesitantly said yes. When a few weeks turned into a few months, Merina started paying extra on her rent and saying it was from Corbin. It wasn’t. He was unemployed, and she quickly learned that his lifestyle was so “carefree” because he essentially mooched off whomever was handy.
Six months later, she came home from work one night to find her parents on the sofa and a note on her bed from Corbin that read, “Sorry, babe.” She learned the next morning her bank accounts had been drained.
In the quiet of the wee hours, sometimes she regretted not pressing charges, but she’d been too embarrassed to tell anyone else the truth: that Liza had effectively unloaded her loser brother onto Merina and bolted.
Merina opened her eyes and met Lorelei’s sweet, concerned gaze. “I don’t know if that’s a good argument, Lore. Maybe the lesson I’m to learn is don’t trust a man who needs something from me.”
Lorelei patted Merina’s arm, then pulled her hand away. “Not like Reese is going to clean out your bank account, babe.”
“Good point.” She’d put that in Crane’s plus column.
“I mean, come on. The last date you went on was with who?”
Her lips flattened. She wasn’t answering that question. But Lore knew the answer.
“Big teeth martini guy.”
Merina laughed, glad for the reprieve. “He didn’t have big teeth!”
“They were really, really white, though. Which against his complexion made them look big.”
“Yech.” Merina couldn’t help that reaction. In the blue lights of the bar, Daniel had been attractive and confident. Once back in his apartment, he was a little slimy. She’d had second thoughts, but then she’d been trying to get past Corbin, so she went through with it. “Well, getting on that horse wasn’t beneficial.”
“Should have been perfect,” Lorelei said thoughtfully. “With his horse teeth and all.”
Merina laughed so hard she had to hold her stomach. Lorelei joined her. Once they sobered, Merina sniffed and sighed and admitted the part about Crane’s offer that was eating at her.
“It’s not the way I saw myself getting married for the first time.”
Not that she’d always dreamed of a poufy gown with bridesmaids and groomsmen flanking her on either side. She had been fairly certain marriage would come as a natural part of a long-lasting relationship. The right long-lasting relationship. Certainly not part of a business agreement. She wrinkled her nose.
“That’s fair,” Lorelei admitted.
“Marriage is supposed to be forever. Engagements are supposed to be overly romantic. Like State Street in the snow around Christmastime,” she said of her parents’ engagement.
“I hear you. My dad took my mom up in a hot air balloon.”
Merina smiled. “And your mom is terrified of heights.” She’d heard the story from Lore’s parents before. It was always a boisterous story filled with laughter. “But shouldn’t it be like that? Uniquely us?”
“Honey, getting married to a billionaire to win your family’s hotel back is as unique as it gets. Not everyone has drop-dead romantic weddings. Look at me.” Lorelei, ever the pragmatist, shrugged. “Vegas and Malcolm McDowell,” she said of her ex-husband. “Life is a series of events. We’re never sure which opportunities are going to come our way.”
“I’ve told myself the same thing. It’s only six months, right?”